Men by their constitutions are naturally divided into two parties: 1. Those who fear and distrust the people, and wish to draw all powers from them into the hands of the higher classes. 2. Those who identify themselves with the people, have confidence in them, cherish and consider them as the most honest and safe, although not the most wise depositary of the public interests.

This is a quote from Thomas Jefferson and “…although not the most wise depository” is my emphasis. It’s also the thought that has been coming to mind recently.

Common people are by definition not “the best” so it’s understandable there will be those who think normal people are not capable of governing themselves. However a frequent component of common people is the ability to recognize the limits of their talents, which will often result in the restraint of humility along with a capacity to understand the faltering limits of others.

“There but for the grace of God go I” would be a phrase more comfortable in the conversation of a common man than an academic “public servant”. And why shouldn’t it be since we’ve all but dismissed the topic of God from our public forums.

Trust me on this – the greatest powers of God are reserved for the weak and the humble. And the opposite is very much true as well – pride is a nearly insurmountable obstacle to receiving God’s grace.

So while the common man is not the best at everything, he has a resource available that may as well be considered a secret weapon in the eyes of those who would look down upon him. And that weapon is the grace of God.

So this article is about the MSM treating Dem politicians better than R’s. That’s old news to me, however I noticed this in the comments about the surfboard photo:

Whats worse is the surfer photo is clearly staged. First, nobody travels with boards not in surfboard travel bags. Besides protection, it keeps the wax off you your Mens Warehouse suit when you carry it, you nitwits.

Some brilliant staffer thought this would be a great idea to connect with the youth vote, or some crap like that, and didn’t like the way the board bags looked (“guys, take the boards out of the bag so we can see them. And take those leashes off, that doesn’t look good”). Also, only one of the guys knows how to carry the board correctly. Pathetic.

So my observation is this administration is starting it’s 3rd year and they’re still making bonehead mistakes. Not that this is foreign policy type of stuff, but seriously – wasn’t this supposed to be the cream of the crop Ivy League grads and all that crap?

There are so many liberal/progressive ideas that just don’t make sense…

From the comments section:

In addition to the health care mandate, we have the bureacrats telling us what we can eat, how much to exercise and that we can’t drink alcohol, soda or tap water. Oh, we also can’t introduce smoke tobacco variety into our bodies, but we should legalize pot marijuana smoking.

So GM’s fate remains to be seen but at least from the above article I’m seeing similar opinions from others. The comments section in particular spells out exactly why I’m rooting for GM’s failure – yes, I think GM should fail. All companies that are poorly run, receive government handouts, and step all over innocent investors (who thought they were buying a Dow Jones index quality stock) should fail… the sooner the better.

And just to make sure it’s captured, here’s the comment from the above article that spells it out:

jms

Because the Obama administration allowed GM to restructure without touching the Union contracts, GM was placed right back on a new, slightly longer trajectory towards bankruptcy, which will occur under an unsympethetic Tea Party / Republican administration. This whole mess was a big scoop of tax dollars handed over to the unions to keep the party going for a year or two.

Personally, my resentment lies not in the bailout, but in the fact that the “pre-packaged bankruptcy” was really just a collusion between the Obama Administration, the Obama-controlled TARP banks, and GM to muscle the bondholders out of the way and hand the company over to the unions.

Bondholders are supposed to receive 100% of their money before unsecured creditors see a penny, but because the Obama Administration had seized control of the major banks holding the majority of GM bonds, and rewarded them by allowing them to borrow huge amounts of money interest-free from the Fed and purchase interest-bearing Treasury bills, a majority of the government-control bond holders “agreed” to forfeit their bonds. The small bondholders, like the Indiana Teachers Union and anyone and everyone who ever purchased GM bonds individually as a retirement investment were the victims of this act of outright big-government/big business theft.

That’s why I will never, ever buy another GM or Chrysler product again. To do so would be the moral equivalent of receiving stolen property. The company is permanently deeply tainted by the lawless theft of bond assets from the individuals and small investors who put their faith in the laws of the United States of America that this would not — could not — ever happen.

As far as I’m concerned GM and Chrysler can’t go bankrupt and out of business fast enough.

Today, 07:31:51 – Flag – Reply

11/20/2010 – Something doesn’t add up… GM does an IPO that is wildly successful, even to the point of driving the market up 10% in a single day.

Why?

Did the UAW disappear? Did the government’s meddling in their business vanish? Did orders for the Volt jump enormously?

I just don’t get what has changed about GM since they entered bankruptcy earlier this year. And I realize I don’t know all the subtle angles of every issue involved here… but something just doesn’t add up.